Walking burns roughly 60 calories per 1,000 steps for a 180-pound person. A 2017 study found that adding 25 minutes of daily walking produced 3 pounds more fat loss over 12 weeks. The 10,000-step target came from marketing but aligns with actual activity recommendations.
Questions this video answers
A marketing tool used to sell early pedometers in Japan (not originally scientific).
About 8,000 steps per day.
Roughly 60 calories per 1,000 steps.
Three hours of walking per week (≈25 minutes/day; ≈2,000–3,000 added steps/day); the walking group lost around 3 pounds more fat over 12 weeks.
Transitioning from likely >10,000 steps/day down to below 5,000 steps/day was reported to reduce energy expenditure by "roughly 6,700 calories less per day" in the transcript.
Walking is hands down one of the most effective, yet underrated forms of activity that you can do to burn off fat. I mean, just speaking from my own experience, I've personally tried it all for fat loss. Hi, cardio, steady state cardio circuit training, everything. What I found is that by simply doing the majority of my cardio in the form of walking and just aiming to get more steps every day was by far the easiest and most effective way for me to consistently burn more calories and and lean down without leaving my body destroyed and without sparking my appetite like the other forms of cardio would do. Not only that though, but the beauty about walking is that it can literally be done anywhere. And as you'll see later on in this video, drastically increasing your step count can easily be done even in the comfort of your own home by just implementing a few simple tips. But before we dive into that, let's first attempt to answer how many steps you should be taking to lose fat in the first place. And typically the number that pops into most people's heads is 10,000 steps a day, as that's usually used as the ideal benchmark to aim for. But this idea of 10,000 steps a day was actually just simply a marketing tool that was used for the sales of the first developed pedometers in Japan. It actually didn't have any scientific backing behind it at that time, but research now shows that it actually does have some validity to it. For instance, in order to hit the public health's recommendation of getting in 30 minutes of moderate physical activity a day, its been shown that this translates to roughly 8,000 steps a day. And in terms of weight loss, when we again convert activity recommendations to steps, it's been shown that bumping your steps up to around 10,000 steps per day is most effective for not only losing fat, but also keeping that fat off in the long term. Meaning that 10,000 steps a day seems to actually be a good general number to strive for in terms of overall health and long term weight management. However, with that being said for fat loss, the truth is that the ideal number of steps for you and what's going to enable you to draw fat and stay lean on ultimately depends on your diet and where your average step count is right now. For example, without going over it in depth and boring you with the math, when you crunch the numbers, you'll find that an average 180 pound individual can expect to burn roughly 60 calories per thousand steps when walking at a moderate pace. So if you're currently maintaining your weight with an average step count of, let's say 6,000 steps a day. Then for every 1,000 additional steps you took per day, you you'd be able to bump up your calorie expenditure by around 60 calories. And given that there's roughly 3,500 calories in a pound of fat, if you kept your diet and everything else the same, then by Simply going from 6,000 steps a day to 8,000 steps a day, you theoretically be able to burn off an extra pound of fat a month. Just by making that subtle change and going from 6,000 steps a day to 10,000 steps a day, you'd theoretically be able to double that and burn off an extra 2 pounds of fat a month. And research has actually unlocked with this. For instance, one 2017 paper from the Journal of Nutrition randomly assigned subjects to either just a low calorie diet or the same low calorie diet plus brisk walking. The walking consisted of a total of three hours of added walking per week, or in other words, an added 25 minutes of walking a day, which would equate to roughly 2,000 to 3,000 added steps per day. After 12 weeks, the walking group lost around 3 pounds more fat than the non walking group, which doesn't sound like much, but its such an easy thing to implement into your routine that can both kick start and considerably speed up the fat loss process for you. However, just keep in mind guys, that this does go both ways because research has shown that when lean active individuals who were likely taking in excess of 10,000 steps a day were then transitioned into a more sedentary lifestyle of below 5,000 steps a day, they ended up burning roughly 6, 700 calories less per day as a result. And since the subjects did not adjust their diet for this and instead just ate as much as they were previously, when they were more active, they obviously began to gain significantly more weight, with most of that weight being stored as fat. Simply indicating that the number of steps that you take per day is a lot more powerful in terms of our body composition than we perceive it to be and therefore should be closely monitored to not only kick start and speed up the fat loss process, but to also keep that fat off once we've lost. So to sum all the previous points up for you, here's what I recommend. If you're currently not very active at the moment and struggling to lean down, then set a realistic goal number of steps you can hit every day in order to help create and maintain a calorie deficit, while ensuring that you don't then compensate by Simply eating more as you do so and aiming for at least 8,000 or even 10,000 steps a day are honestly good targets to aim for if you're currently below that. Not only for increasing the calories you burn every day, but also because research has shown that active individuals who burn more calories throughout the day, whether it be from walking or any other exercise, are able to better control their appetite and food intake due to various physiological changes that start to happen in the body once you become more active. Meaning that the benefits of getting 10,000 or more steps a day go beyond just calories burned and can start to affect the calories inside of the equation, which can therefore speed up your fat loss process to an even greater degree. Now, although 10,000 or even 8,000 steps a day for many of you may seem daunting and out of reach, especially if you're at home most of the day or just sitting at the office. As you're about to see, this really isn't the case and is made so much easier by simply tying it into existing habits that are already part of your daily routine. For example, after every one of your meals for the day. So let's say breakfast, lunch and dinner make it a habit to go for a 10 minute walk immediately after this alone, if done for three meals a day, will add on average a whopping 3,500 steps to your step count. Then tying it into another one of your habits, which you hopefully do every day, rather than checking yourself out in the mirror as you brush your teeth, walk around the house. Assuming that you brush your teeth twice a day for roughly two minutes at a time, this alone can increase your step count by around 400 steps. Next, keep yourself well hydrated and drink more water throughout the day. I personally take more chips to the washroom than probably anyone I know, and assuming it's not a bladder problem, it's because I drink a ton of water. But this also helps me get my steps in because I'm frequently having to get up off my chair to use the washroom. And when I do, I always make it habit to go to the furthest, least convenient washroom available, wherever I'm at. And that may not sound like much, but with for example, three to five extra trips to the washroom throughout the day, this can easily add up another 400 steps or so to your step count, even if you're just at home. And lastly, some of you may end up hating me for this, but what you can do is pick a hallway or doorway in your home and set a rule so that every single time that you pass that hallway, you immediately do 20 jumping jacks. Assuming that you don't forever avoid that hallway and pass through it, let's say five times a day, that's easily another 200 steps if we assume an equivalent of two steps per jumping jack. Now if you tally all of that up, that's easily an additional 4,500 steps added up to your step count. And using our previous assumption of roughly 60 calories burned per thousand steps, you've just managed to increase your metabolism and your daily energy expenditure by 270 calories a day, which would then theoretically result in an additional half a pound of fat being burned per week from those changes alone. So yes, while the goal of hitting something like 10,000 steps a day may seem intimidating and unrealistic at first, and it becomes a lot easier and in reach for you to hit when you apply the tips I went through, I would also highly recommend that you actually purchase some kind of pedometer or use either the health app on iPhone or Google Fit on Android and just get into the habit of monitoring your average steps as this will provide a ton of motivation and accountability to help you hit your goal steps. And as a result of implementing all of that, you'll be able to take advantage of the often underestimated power of walking and expanding experience the many fat loss benefits that it has to offer. But on that note guys, just keep in mind that for the best results, these additional steps you'll be taking need to be paired with a solid nutrition plan and regular weight training routine as that really is what's going to speed up the process for you and set up the foundation for your long term success and for an all in one easy to follow program that shows you exactly how to best combine your nutrition, your workouts and your overall activities so that you can lean down as a focus efficiently as possible with science and simply head on over to billwithscience.com and take the analysis quiz to discover which program is best for you and where your body is currently at. Anyways, that's it for today guys. Thank you so much for watching. I hope you enjoyed this one. Please do me a favor and show your support by giving the video a like leaving a comment down below as to what you'd like to see me cover next, subscribing to the channel and turning on notifications for the channel as well as this all really does help me out and I really appreciate it. Thank you. Thank you so much everyone and see you next time.
